I'm just curious here cause I just did a valve lash job on my honda but didn't notice too much other then it's quiet now.
but other then the noise production how does it effect the car and how it runs? details if you could please.



btw when specs say .006" cold and almost all 12 of the valve where within .012-.025" when cold it makes for a noisy motor.

also as another question could having the valves that loose harm the cam or the valves? I noticed a few spots didn't have a nice shiny lobe on them anymore but it didn't look like they where worn down flat.

 

Gotta assume you're talking about solid lifters, a few .001's in hydraulic, should be no concern.

With solid lifters, you have no slack to take anything up (except heat expansion), so you don't get full lift of the valve and won't fill the cylinder completley if they are too "loose".

The loose valve doesn't begin to move until the slop is taken up, so in effect, that valves timing is behind the others, as well as full lift not being reconized.

 

more or less a solid lifter design I guess you could say. the rocker sits right against the cam.

but when the specs say .006 and the best clearance before the adjustment was .010 and the worst was I think .028 how much damage can that cause?




and mods I just want to ask that please don't close this. while it might not be directly thirdgen related the same ideas can still apply to non-thirdgen cars I would assume.
some here are running solid lifters and many questions are asked about valve lash. so any chane this can stay open?

 

If the valve stem tips arent mushroomed at all i wouldnt worry about any damage.

 

Who said this wasn't about a ThirdGen?

As for the damage, there used to be millions of Chrysler crooked sixes that ran around for years with no lash adjustments performed. Some of them seemed to have lash specifications set by a 12" ruler rather than feeler gauges. They ran forever that way. It was rare to find one that you couldn't hear coming down the street with no valve noise. You could usually pick them out with your eyes closed. Many of the old air cooled VWs were much the same, and ran for a long time.

There are a lot of Mitsubishi I-4s and V-6s that require lash adjustment, and they rarely get it either. Their failures are not usually due to valve lash, but poor head castings.

 

And then there is the SHO's Yamaha V8...

 

But these rockers were set a little too loose from the factory though, not too tight, right? Had they been too tight, the damage would have become quite prevalent before they knew it, especially for a purchaser with a heavy foot....